Rachael's Comment

The weather has recently picked up after another long cold winter and finally spring seems to be in full flow. The sun is shining, the trees are in blossom, and the birds are singing everyone is making the most of the sun. People’s routines can change dramatically now the sun has appeared, they no longer wear layers upon layers of clothes that cover every inch of flesh but instead they appear to take on the challenge of finding ones that expose the absolute most flesh that they can get away with! People flock to local parks or open areas and begin to do previously unheard of things like cook their teas on the ground on portable BBQ’s or spend the afternoon sunbathing in the back garden with a long cold drink. Children run around chasing Frisbees, playing in streams, riding bikes and eating vast quantities of ice creams. Everyone suddenly becomes more alive and happy, even researchers seem to suggest that the sunshine and increased temperatures help to dispel peoples bad moods.

I’d like to suggest though that it isn’t the same for everyone: sun brings lots of pressure too, to look good, to do more active things and to have the garden looking nice. This just isn’t possible for some people.

I have M.E. and while winter does bring many challenges such as negotiating the icy roads with crutches, it is at least acceptable for people to finish work and go home, eat tea and then get snuggled up with a cuppa watching TV or reading a book. Suddenly once the sun comes out this is no longer OK, people instead should be mowing lawns, chasing children around the park or going on long walks admiring the scenery.. Now don’t for one minute think I wouldn’t love to do any of those things, there is nothing I would love more than spending the day hiking through the Peaks with my children, eating a picnic on top of a hill, dipping our feet in a stream and just generally surveying all that Mother Nature has to offer! Sadly for many people with any sort of physical difficulty this is not always an option, instead all our energy and strength goes on the mundane tasks that we all have to do and take for granted, such as getting out of bed, getting dressed, making and eating food and for some working or doing the school runs. Life becomes about weighing up these options and trying to balance out what energy you have for that day, everything has to become a choice between things rather than an as well as.

As examples of this I often have to weigh up if I go to bed early, stay in and rest all the day before and conserve all my energy will that be enough to allow me to make a picnic and sit on a rug on the grass while my children play the next day? If I really push it so I won’t be able to do anything the day after will I be able to squeeze a walk in there too?

I’m not writing this in order to garner sympathy but instead so people actually look around them and see if there are people who maybe aren’t able to enjoy the new sunshine as much as they would like to. Maybe you have an elderly relative or neighbour who is no longer able to do their garden or get out and about, or maybe you know someone who for whatever reason is not as physically capable as you? Maybe instead of spending one afternoon in your own garden or Local Park you could see if there is anything you can do to help them enjoy the sunshine too? It might be as simple as just helping them to get a chair, drink and a book outside or maybe you could spare an hour to help tidy their garden so they can enjoy the bright spring flowers too? Mostly it doesn’t have to be huge gestures or big expense to make a difference to someone’s day.

Be Good, Be Beautiful: The Fashion Show

The words ‘Fairtrade Fashion’ often conjure up images of hemp sacks and tie die, but the world of Fairtrade fashion and beauty is far from that. With beautiful jewellery, on trend fashion and fantastic choice the Fairtrade community is bursting with vibrant produce. ‘Be Good, Be Beautiful’ events aim to promote this. This year Sheffield’s Blue Shed will be the home, for two nights only, of ‘Be Good, Be Beautiful: The Fashion Show’ a night of local and national fair-trade goods. Hosted by Sophie Mei and Ruth Amos this will be an event not to be missed, with partners such as People Tree, Ethics Girls, Bishopstons Trading, The Body Shop, The Co-operative Society and The English Rose Bakery. Live music from Hayley Toothill and other live acts. All ages are welcome and all proceeds raised will go to Habitat for Humanity. Habitat for Humanity works around the world with volunteers from all backgrounds, races and religions to build homes together with families in need.

Yes you read correctly, Be Good Be Beautiful is having its first ever Fashion Show!

27th and 28th April The Blue Shed, Sheffield 7.30pm-9.30pm

if you would like to be involved, their are three ways:

Attend- come along, bring friends and family and enjoy :)

Have a Stall- If you have your own FairTrade business and would like to be involved, please email me.

Model-We are looking for about 20 volunteers to act as models for clothes and accessories over the two evenings. Previous experience preferred, though not essential!

You must be: · Over 18 years old · Enthusiastic · Able to attend both evenings (7.30 – 9.30 p.m), a walk through meeting on Saturday 23rd April and a rehearsal from 3.45 p.m on the afternoon of Wednesday 27th April · Willing to follow direction and wear allocated outfits and accessories · Able to provide plain black top and trousers/leggings for yourself

If you are interested in taking part please contact Ruth Amos by email at ruth@stairsteady.net and we will get back to you with further details. There will be no payment for taking part, but an entry ticket for one evening will be given so that a friend or member of your family can come along for free!

All proceeds from both evenings will go to the charity ‘Habitat for Humanity’

Tickets are £5.00 they can be bought from http://www.eventbrite.com/event/1570961789 please spread the word and please attend :)

Thank you and hopefully see you soon,

Ruth

Lily Allen’s-Riches to Rags

I was going to blog about this last week, but wasn’t quite sure what I thought about the show, but watching last night’s episode, I have to say, I’m a fan. Now for those that haven’t seen the show it follow Lily, her sister Sarah and there ‘brand manager’ as they set about opening a rent and buy vintage clothes shop in London.

Now before I go on I must say I have read a lot of the negative comments in the press about Lily not wanting Fame and then doing the show, and about how much of a success the shop really is, HOWEVER the this is not what interests me, yes Lily is being very honest, but the thing that I like about the show is the business. They are starting with a lot of Lily’s own money, but the chemistry between the girls and they ins and outs of starting a business is something that I think makes great TV. It isn’t easy for anyone starting a business we all have to put in hours and I was impressed (in this week’s episode) with Sarah’s real dedication to the business. Yes they were pitching at Coutts which is a lovely environment to pitch, but she is still pitching.

The programme is a little backwards, but that for me is one of the things that make it watchable. You are seeing two sisters embark on a journey, doing something that they have no previous knowledge in and giving it a go. Personally I think that that is refreshing and courageous. Having started a business myself with no past experience, I can really feel for the girls. I know that they are starting from a different point than most businesses but the fact that they want to do something that takes guts and time (not just invest it in someone else’s business) shows the passion that they both have for this venture.

I know that many people have different views on this programme, but I wish them all the best of luck and look forward to tuning in next Tuesday night at 10pm after Katie: my beautiful friends (which deserves it own blog post) .

IN and OUT

IN
Manufacturing- As its drawing to the end of the Global Manufacturing Festival, Manufacturing is in at right at the top of my IN list!

Uggs- I am currently living in mine, they are SO comfy. Have nothing more to say on the topic.

Hulluimi- one of my new discovery’s, along with Rice ilk in tea, and you can grill it. I must say I’m a fan.

Radio1- it seems weeks ago, but this time last week Chris Moyles and Comedy Dave started there 50hour radio stint. I loved every minute of it. It’s not an easy thing to do, it’s not just talking (although Dave was struggling with that towards the end) it is all the clips that need playing and the ‘mixing’ of the show. Fearne did her bit by wearing a swimming costume and helping to add over half a million to there total of nearly 2million. Well Done lads!
Here is a video of Fearne in here costume from the BBC Youtube channel.

Rugby- I was kindly invited by Smith Cooper to join them at the Nottingham V Bristol match. It was such a good afternoon, good company, good food and a good win! The match was really exciting and I’ve already been checking out the next matches at Sheffield.

OUT

VAT- Yay! It’s gone, all done sent off, round of applause for me. I am usually dashing round the last few days of the month, but it went off on Monday and I am more than a little chuffed (can you tell).

Head Colds- I’m fed up with this head cold, it will not shift and I’m sat snuffling around the office

Dry Skin- on a shallow note, I have been using Garnier intense 7day body lotion for the past week and a half and it’s a winner!

Bank cards- I managed to lose my bank card on a night out and the last few days have been very frustrating without my card, but it’s scary how much I rely on it. It’s nice to have my replacement, but we forget how much we depend on these little bits of plastic.

Rachael's Comment

As today is Red Nose Day I thought I might look at one of the issues affecting the UK as much of the media for today is focused on the issues faced by other countries. While there is no doubt at all that other countries face terrible hardships and poverty there is also many similar issues much closer to home.

Following some research I found that there in England in 2007 the number of households officially recognised as newly homeless was 99,500. While this in its self sounds quite high I found that Government statistics do not include people who satisfy the legal definition of homelessness but have not applied to be classified as such, nor people who were officially recognised as homeless in previous years but were deemed 'not in priority need'. The charity Crisis has estimated that there are around 400,000 additional hidden homeless people that would need to be included in the above figure.

These figures really shocked me the actual level of homelessness is almost 4 times the governments published figures. As I carried on reading I realised that there are many different types of and definitions of homelessness. Crisis has the following definitions:
· Legally homeless: A household is legally homeless if either there is no accommodation that they are entitled to occupy or they have accommodation but it is not reasonable for them to continue to occupy this accommodation.

· Officially recognised as homeless: Those who are both legally homeless and have successfully applied to their local authority to be classified as such in the current year. A household can be legally homeless but not recognised by the state as being homeless because they have not applied to be classified as such.

· Statutory homeless: Households that have been found to be eligible for assistance, unintentionally homeless and falling within a priority need group and thus owed a main homelessness duty by a local housing authority. In 2006-07, 73,360 households were accepted as statutory homeless in England. Local Authorities made 159,330 decisions on homelessness applications.

· Hidden homeless: This refers to homeless households, which may or may not have applied to local authorities for homeless status, but are not entitled to any accommodation. Crisis estimates that there are around 400,000 such 'hidden homeless' adults at any point in time.
These definitions go some way to explain the way in which the figures are so misleading. The Government only recognises people in its statistics as homeless if they are considered to be vulnerable. Looking closer it appears that 72% of acceptances are people with dependents or pregnant women, which would suggest that if a person is single or has no dependents then they are unlikely to be officially recognised as homeless and therefore will not qualify for any government assistance. Since the largest percentage of homeless people are male (61 percent), white (51 percent) and not suffering from any chronic illness or substance abuse, it is clear that the governments current method of classifying people are excluding the highest numbers of people in need.

I found another Charity, Thames Reach, again had very similar figures for homelessness. They had the following breakdown:
Statutory homeless: 74,690 households in temporary accommodation (up to June 2008)
Around 16,000 people annually are found to be homeless but not in priority need
Over 8,000 people annually are found to be homeless but not entitled to housing as a result of being intentionally homeless.

Rough sleepers: 483 people sleep rough on any one night in England (June 2008)
200-300 people sleep rough on any one night in London
3017 different people sleep rough over a year in London (2007-08)

Hostels: 16,686 hostel bed-spaces in London
40,000 hostel bed-spaces in United Kingdom
At least 75,000 individuals use hostels over a year

Hidden homeless: Estimated at 400,000.
Once all the categories of homelessness are included in the figure it shows that nearly (approximately 574,000) 1% of the population could be classed as homeless. To make that easier to visualise it is about the number of people who live in Sheffield or Glasgow. It is significantly more people than live in any of the following cities: Edinburgh (450,000), Liverpool (440,000) and Manchester (420,000).
So although I would still love to encourage you to do all you can for Red Nose Day today I want to ask you to also consider getting involved in a local charity to help some of the people in this country who equally need your help and support.

Global Manufacturing Festival

14th - 24th March 2011

Sheffield has had many events over the past few weeks to celebrate Global Manufacturing and Sheffield’s place in that. I was lucky enough to attend the Education and Business Leader Dinner at The Cutlers Hall. It was a fantastic event to help schools and business work together, discuss and plan towards making education and business work hand in hand to get our young people ‘work ready’. It was a really inspiring event and I met some really passionate head teacher’s and business leaders.

More recently I attended the ‘Get up to Speed Event’ at my favourite venue ‘The Blue Shed’. It was an afternoon and evening event that had some world class speakers and demonstrations. Along with Made in Sheffield, designed in Sheffield, Bloodhound SSC and many others, the event was open to the public and had a session particularly aimed at children and parents.

One of the most exciting speakers was the very talented Russ Danzey, I have known Russ for a few years now and even had the pleasure of speaking alongside him at a Pecha Kutach Event. In 2005 Russ won his first Cadet novice race and since then he is one of the UK’s up and coming young drivers KF2 Kart Formula 2, he competed in UK Series and was the youngest competitor to qualify for the European Championships. In 2010 after winning the John Surtees Scholarship Russ took the opportunity to step in to single seater cars and raced in Formula Young Guns taking first podium in only his third weekend of racing. He really is someone to keep an eye on and I caught up with Russ at the event and he told me a bit about his car and sponsors.

The Global Manufacturing Festival is a real platform for Sheffield to really show everyone what we do and why we are world-renowned!

IN and OUT

IN

Science and Engineering- after leaving the Big Bang Fair with so many ideas, science and engineering are defiantly IN at the moment.

Women- after International Women’s day reminded us how FAB women are they had to make it in my IN list!

Friends coming home- a good friend of mine has come back from being away and it’s so nice to see her, the girls all hit the town and it was such a fantastic night!

Nails- loving playing around with my nails, and now the screw in kid. This look was achieved with ring binder strengtheners.

Sleep- I think I must be fighting something off, last night I got twelve hours sleep! Can’t remember the last time I got that much sleep!

Writing- it’s so nice to have time to write and be creative, I love blogging more and over the last few weeks have started to get creative again writing plays, prayers and stories.

OUT

Pancakes- after Pancake Day, were now into lent. I love lent, I find it helps to focus me, not just on my faith but on my life, so this year I’m trying to be balanced and healthy.

The gym- having not been to the gym for over 2 weeks I am managing surprisingly well, mind you that hasn’t meant that I haven’t exercised, just not in a gym.

Emails- having reached 500 unread emails on my phone I spent a few hours Saturday night clearing out my inbox on my blackberry. It took a while but it’s great to be up to date. I must add that I read and deal with them on my computer but it doesn’t always re-sync that to my phone. I didn’t have 500 emails that I hadn’t dealt with.

Breaking my laptop- since cracking my laptop screen just over a year ago I get very paranoid about my laptop, also the fashion conscious side of me is fed up of carrying around flight cases, so I got myself a knomo laptop case, they had a few of their bags reduced and I jumped at the chance. They are gorgeous, I love mine.